Barrow Gurney’s promotion hopes ended after yet another game settled by the barest of margins.
Barrow and Frenchay 2s were in a direct fight for the second promotion place in Division 5 and Frenchay were the visitors at Hobbs Lane on Saturday. Put into bat, Frenchay’s Isaac Stell started positively, and despite an early strike by Mark Fisher (1/30) they comfortable reached 100 with Stell having made 78 of them. Barrow then mounted a spirited fightback with some much-improved fielding supporting the bowlers. Matt Owen (4/39) was the pick of the bowlers but found good support from Nick Heal (2/20) and there was a wicket each for Jonny Sykes, Connor Jones and Guy Fisher.
Matt Owen celebrates another wicket taking 4 for 39 in all
Frenchay finished on 199 all out which represented a good fightback for the Barrow outfit, and they went into bat confident of chasing down the total.
Kieran Owen continued where he left off last week, playing the anchor roles and manipulating the strike, and after losing makeshift opener Connor Jones on 23, he put together a partnership of 117 with Mark Brown. Brown was the more aggressive hitting shots all-round the wicket with 11 boundaries before he holed out at long off for 64. This proved to be the turning point as Owen fell almost immediately for 57. Then Barrow’s recent middle order frailties surfaced again as another couple of quick wickets suddenly put Frenchay on top.
Kieran Owen continued his good form with 57
Mark Fisher played responsible for 23 and kept the home side in the game as it started to go down to the wire. 2 massive sixes from Jonny Sykes left Barrow in with a chance with 4 needed off the last 2 balls but they couldn’t get them ending on 197-9.
Mark Brown again top scored with 64
A disappointing end to a season where Barrow had led Division 5 at the halfway stage, but after some close and exciting games, the team fell fractionally short on too many occasions. Barrow captain, Frank Forge, whose own season had been dogged by injury, announced that he would be stepping down after next week’s final league fixture after 4 years at the helm.
Picturesque Tockington Manor was the venue for Barrow Seconds’ penultimate game of the season against Thornbury 4ths. Barrow put up a good showing with the bat with Mark Gracey making another half century (53), and with contributions from Jordan Allen (19), Ali Hood (24), Sam Mitchell (24) and Adam Brace (25 not out), a competitive total of 223-8 was posted.
Thornbury briefly threatened to chase down the score with an excellent partnership between James Slade (43) and Matthew Scarborough (72) but once they had been dismissed by Mike York and Adam Brace respectively, the Barrow bowlers started to chip away at the remaining batting line up. Brace (2/11) and Steve Owen (2/40) had the best figures as Thornbury mustered 185 all out to leave them 38 runs short.
A closing win would see the Barrow team comfortable in mid-table in Division 13.